Epic Wheel Spins Across the West

(2018 Alaska Ep 12)

A few years ago, we became interested old train lines that have been converted to recreational bicycle trails. Many of our camping trips, including this one, involve riding these and other recreational bike trails.

We’re not skinny tire, spandex britches, 60-miles-in-a-day sorts of riders. Our bikes have wider tires, we wear comfortable clothes and our rides are usually 15-20 miles. This gives us something healthy and fun to do while camping.

Our bikes and associated gear travel in the back of our truck. Here are some rides we’ve done so far:

Austin: Ann and Roy Butler Trail at Lady Bird Lake

(RabbiTRAILS Alaska trip pt #8) We were amazed at the number of riders, walkers and runners enjoying this trail in the middle of a workday. The trail circles Lady Bird Lake adjacent to downtown Austin (click for more). The trail is mostly shaded and an easy ride.

This ride was a welcome diversion while our camper was being repaired.

Santa Fe: Arroyo De Los Chamisos Trail

(Map pt #13) Our ride in Santa Fe was disappointing and brief. Although this trail is a good connector to a number of other bike trails in Santa Fe, it was not easily accessible from our campground. In addition, parking in Santa Fe was a challenge.

So, we enjoyed walking the streets of historic downtown Santa Fe instead. There are many colorful shops and vendors selling jewelry and other items in the historic town square area.

Carbondale: Rio Grande Bike Trail

(Map pt #15) The Rio Grande Trail is a 42-mile rail trail that follows the Aspen Branch of the historic Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad. It parallels the beautiful Roaring Fork River in numerous places.

We rode from the campground a short distance to downtown Carbondale and loaded our bikes on a public bus. The bus took us about 15 miles up the valley towards Aspen. The ride back to Carbondale and our campground was mostly downhill!

The day was an 11 on a scale of 10! Our ride took us past yellow-flowered fields and dense wooded areas in a valley between mountain ranges. We ate a packed lunch overlooking the Roaring Fork River.

Glenwood Springs: Glenwood Canyon Trail

(Map pt #15) Interstate 70 spans Colorado east-west. After crossing the Rocky Mountains west of Denver, the highway passes through Glenwood Canyon for 12.5 miles on its way to Grand Junction and beyond. The highway is an amazing engineering accomplishment, with extensive viaducts and elevated roads as it winds through the steep-walled canyon. It follows the Colorado River (that eventually reaches the Grand Canyon!), a Union Pacific rail line and includes a paved bike trail.

An outfitter in Glenwood Springs transported us and our bikes up the canyon and dropped us off for the mostly downhill 16-mile ride back to Glenwood Springs. We got to to see I-70 engineering from the bottom, rafters on the Colorado River, an Amtrak train and much more.

Rabbit Tracks / Map

(2018 Alaska Ep 11)

We’ve been on the road a month today! What a journey so far…and much more to come.

A couple of you have asked if we could post a map of our trip.

Try this link (RabbiTRAILS Alaska trip) and let us know how it works. If it works, we’ll keep it updated and include the link in future postings.

Along the LONG ROAD

(2018 Alaska Ep 10)

We’ve driven nearly 5000 miles and have many to go before we reach Alaska.

Overall, the roads and related traffic have been good. The scenery has been outstanding. Construction has been infrequent for very short distances.

There are always interesting things to see along the road. Like a sign in Oklahoma Hitchhikers Could be Inmates, or the town of No Name near Glenwood Springs, Colorado. Here are some more:

On an Interstate highway near Dallas, a rest area had silos for men’s and women’s bathrooms. I wonder what the windmill was for?

For you country music fans, we passed by Luckenbach, Texas, made famous by the late Waylon Jennings (click to hear). Ain’t nuthin much in the area, except a couple sound stages, a gift shop and lots of laid back country attitude. Closest decent-sized town is Fredericksburg, Texas, about 15 miles away.

Here is the world’s largest pistachio nut. There are numerous groves of pistachio and pecan trees in the New Mexico desert north of White Sands/Alamogordo.

We saw a jackelope (mythical jackrabbit with antelope horns) at a roadside stand in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Finally, we camped near a turtle-shaped rock in the Colorado mountains near Buena Vista, Colorado. It was a beautiful vista indeed!

Lots of Sand But No Beach

(2018 Alaska Ep 9)

We headed west from Blanco on May 1.

Our next stop was Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico.

The drive was a bit too far for one day, so we spent the night at a west Texas state park known for its large sand dunes. They don’t call then dunes however – at Monahans State Park they are known as sandhillls.

One theory is the Monahans Sandhills were formed by remnants of the Rocky Mountains in New Mexico that eroded in the Pecos River. The sand was eventually blown by the wind into the area.

The sandhills are located atop the Permian Basin, one of the largest oil-producing areas in the world.

We visited some world class dunes in New Mexico also. Outside of Alamogordo is White Sands National Monument. The dunes are indeed brilliant white.

White Sands is the largest gypsum dunes on earth (275 square miles), the dunes are clearly visible from space and they are constantly moving – some as many as 32 feet year!

A couple interesting facts:

The White Sands dunes, created from eroding mountains to the west, are only about 10,000 years old.

In many areas, the water table is just a few feet below the dunes.

A dune selfie…hats and sunglasses are essential equipment at White Sands!

Touring San Antonio

(2018 Alaska Ep 8)

My brother, his wife and their daughter live in Boerne, located a little less than an hour from the campground in Blanco. We had a delightful dinner with them one evening and were joined by my other niece, her husband and their eight year old son.

The next day we toured San Antonio.

Alamo? No. Riverwalk? No. Hemisphere Plaza? No. Been there, done those!

Instead we started with the site of the Pearl Brewery.

Pearl Beer is a well-known in Texas. The former brewery has been converted into a beautiful shopping, entertainment and residential district.

We had an authentic Mexican lunch at Mi Tierra Café y Panadaria in El Mecado/Market Square. The food was wonderful!

To finish our San Antonio tour, we visited the San Antonio Japanese Tea Garden. It was developed in an abandoned limestone quarry donated in 1899 and developed starting in 1917. See the link above for the interesting history of the gardens.

We Took an Enchanted Excursion

(2018 Alaska Ep 7)

Camper repairs behind us (hopefully), we set up camp in Blanco State Park for a four-night stay. The campground is centrally located between Fredericksburg, Austin, San Antonio and my brother’s home in Boerne.

We were also close to Enchanted Rock and enchanted BBQ.

The Rock

Enchanted Rock is a pink granite mountain about 17 miles north of Fredericksburg. According to Trails.com, a hike to the summit of Enchanted Rock has been a right of passage for every teenaged Texan since the 1960s. Although we are neither Texans nor teenagers, we decided to tackle the short (.4 mile) and steep trail (332 ft elevation gain) to the top.

From a distance Enchanted Rock somewhat resembles Ayers Rock in Australia and Stone Mountain in Georgia. Up close, it is rather daunting – a steep hike up the side of the mountain looks challenging. From the top, what a view! Long vistas of the stunning Texas Hill Country.

Why Enchanted Rock is enchanted (and more)

The BBQ

Having successfully ascended and descended the rock, it was lunchtime and we HAD to experience the enchanted BBQ of Cooper’s BBQ in Llano, about 15 miles north.

Smokey ribs, fork-tender brisket, cowboy pinto beans, white bread and MUCH more – there’s no better BBQ on the planet!

We saved a little room and finished our lunch with some pecan cobbler.

On the way back to Blanco we stopped at Fredericksburg, a town with many interesting shops along a wide main street through the center of town. Fredericksburg is surrounded by many bed and breakfasts and wineries. It’s a great place to visit for a special occasion or stop-off during a trip like ours.

Flexibility Part 2

(2018 Alaska Ep 6)

(Sorry for the delay is blog updates. We have had very limited Internet connectivity over the past week…)

We arrived in the San Antonio area on Tuesday, April 24. Although the issues with the camper slide were better, we had continued concerns and decided to take the camper to a dealer in New Braunfels, Texas, a community just north of San Antonio.

The news wasn’t good. The base of the slide was seriously rotted and needed to be repaired. The repair estimate was considerable!

Rot is typically caused by a water leak somewhere. The repairman couldn’t identify the source of the leak, but the evidence speaks for itself.

We prayed for wisdom – invest in the cost to repair the slide damage, return home to sell/trade the camper (thus cancelling our Alaska trip for this year) or something else?

The decision? We decided the damage would have to be repaired before we could sell/trade the camper. The repair would be costly whether completed in Florida or Texas. The RV dealer had immediate availability to make the repair – often such repairs take weeks.

So, we spent two nights in a hotel nearby while the slide was repaired. It was like RV open heart surgery – the slide had to be removed, damage repaired and reinstalled.

With the repair completed and all possible sources of water leaks sealed with caulk, we are continuing our journey to Alaska!

The Bible cautions not to store treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, or thieves can steal. Although not specifically mentioned, we think rot is part of this truth as well. Our camper is a means to make our journey possible, but we need to keep focused on things of eternal value.

This likely won’t be our last chance to be flexible and trust God during this trip. Regardless, we’ll praise Him through it all!

Lone Star

(2018 Alaska Ep 5)

We left Kansas City after an evening stay and headed south to Wagoner, Oklahoma. In Wagoner we visited Pat’s cousin and her mother’s family home site. After two nights it was time to travel further south.

You might think this is a follow up to the earlier post about Superman, perhaps about Captain America.

It is actually a star at the Texas Welcome Center on US 75 north of Dallas.

Texas is called “The Lone Star State” to reflect its former status as an independent republic. The star is also a reminder of the state’s struggle for independence from Mexico and can be found on the Texas state flag and state seal.

In front of the lone star and welcome center is a beautiful field of bluebonnets, the Texas state flower.

Flexibility Part 1

(2018 Alaska Ep 4)

It has been a rather interesting week since our last blog post.

Our plans to bike a portion of Missouri’s Katy Rail Trail and to visit the Gateway Arch in downtown St Louis while in the St Louis area didn’t materialize due to problems with our camper.

We spent much of one day troubleshooting the problems with a RV service business and then several hours the next day picking up some critical parts. By then, it was time to head to Kansas City for a visit with Pat’s aunt and uncle.

When RVing, when on long trip and with life overall, flexibility is VERY important.

Life doesn’t always happen as one expects. In the unexpected, we learn we are not in control and must trust that God IS in control and has a purpose for changed plans.

King Neptune: A Patriotic Porker

(2018 Alaska Ep 3)

Leaving Metropolis and the bigger-than-life Superman, we drove Illinois 149 headed toward the Mississippi River and eventually St Louis. It was in the middle of nowhere, a welcome respite from the Interstate winds and traffic..

By then, it was time for lunch.

Towing an RV is always an opportunity for an impromptu picnic and ahead was a pullout for a memorial of some kind. I walked around to the look at memorial after lunch.

To my surprise, it was a memorial to King Neptune.

According to online sources, King Neptune (May 16, 1942 – May 14, 1950) was a pig used by a United States Navy recruiter to raise $19 million in war bonds (over $250 million in 2012 adjusted for inflation ) for the construction of the Iowa-class battleship Illinois between 1942 and 1946.

More About this Patriotic Porker

Most pigs give their all for the breakfast table. King Neptune gave his for his country.